By Omeiza Ajayi

ABUJA: Vice President Kashim Shettima, yestersday returned presidential nomination and expression of interest forms on behalf of President Bola Tinubu, formally entering the incumbent into the All Progressives Congress, APC, presidential primary race, on the last day designated for the submission of such documents.

At an elaborate event in Abuja, the APC declared that Nigeria had turned a corner under Tinubu’s leadership and deserved continuity.

The forms were submitted at the Bola Ahmed Tinubu International Conference Centre, BATIC, in Abuja, a venue set apart exclusively for the president, while other aspirants submitted their forms at a hotel designated for the exercise.

The occasion came a day after the party’s National Working Committee, NWC, at its 188th meeting on Wednesday, waived the screening requirements for Tinubu, declaring him automatically cleared to participate in the upcoming primary elections without appearing before a screening committee.

The NWC argued that Tinubu had already received overwhelming endorsement from the Progressive Governors Forum, the leadership of the National Assembly, and other party organs at the APC National Summit of May 22, 2025, and that subjecting him to another screening would be “redundant and unnecessary” given that he had already been screened and cleared ahead of the 2022 presidential primaries.

Delivering remarks, at yesterday’s event, Shettima said it was a reaffirmation of confidence in a president he said had proven his capacity under pressure and steered Nigeria out of a period of severe economic turbulence.

“The President has delivered on the mandate of stability and national revival. The storms of the past years have not diminished him. They have made a party hero out of him,” he said.

Shettima recalled that when Tinubu assumed office, Nigeria’s foreign reserves stood at approximately $33.99 billion, insufficient, he said, to support the importation of oil for even one month. Rather than deflect blame, he argued, the president took difficult but necessary decisions to stabilise the economy and restore investor confidence.

“We have crossed the river. We are out of the dark tunnel. Nigeria is on a path to recovery and growth,” Shettima said, urging all Nigerians regardless of political affiliation, religion or background to support Tinubu’s candidacy in 2027.

APC National Chairman Prof. Nentawe Yilwatda, described the occasion as one of continuity of bravery, infrastructure development and economic reform  and reminded party members that the National Executive Committee NEC, the second highest decision-making organ of the APC, had already unanimously endorsed the president for a second term at last year’s meeting.

“All of us seated here who are members of NEC are bound by the decision we made last year as a commitment to Mr President,” Yilwatda said.

He explained that the NWC’s waiver of screening was designed to preserve the dignity of that earlier endorsement.

The APC chairman offered an extensive defence of the Tinubu administration’s record, citing what he described as landmark infrastructure projects including a Lagos-to-Kano-to-Maradi railway corridor, the Ajaokuta-Kaduna-Kano, AKK, gas pipeline, the ongoing construction of a road corridor of over 1,000 kilometres from Badagry to Sokoto, and reforms to modernise the nation’s ports.

On the railway project, Yilwatda argued that the Maradi dry port would position Nigeria as a critical gateway for landlocked neighbours including Niger, Chad, Sudan and Burkina Faso, opening a major non-oil revenue stream for the country. On the Badagry-Sokoto corridor, he said it would support over 300 dams for irrigation and agriculture, creating one of the largest food production belts in Nigeria.

APC govs back consensus primary for Tinubu, vow to campaign on administration’s record

Meanwhile, all the 31 governors of the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC, have thrown their weight behind a consensus arrangement for President Tinubu’s return as the party’s presidential candidate in 2027.

Chairman of the Progressive Governors’ Forum PGF and Imo State governor, Senator Hope Uzodimma made the declaration on their behalf, yesterday, in Abuja during the submission of Tinubu’s nomination and expression of interest forms. 

According to him, the 31 APC-controlled states are united behind the president and committed to marketing his administration’s record to secure re-election.

Uzodimma told party leaders, members of the National Assembly and the Federal Executive Council FEC that the governors’ endorsement of a second term for the president was not a new position but a fulfilment of a resolution made at the APC Political Summit last year, where governors elected on the platform of the party unanimously encouraged Tinubu to seek re-election.

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